


name the stars

by rmaowl



Category: Voltron: Legendary Defender
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Anxiety, Baby Names, Childhood Memories, Childhood Trauma, Crying, Emetophobia, Emotional Roller Coaster, Emotionally Repressed, Exhaustion, Fire, Gen, Heavy Angst, Home, Implied/Referenced Self-Harm, Internet, Keith (Voltron) Angst, Keith (Voltron) is Bad at Feelings, Keith (Voltron) is a Mess, Keith (Voltron)-centric, Kerberos Mission, LGBTQ Themes, Memories, Men Crying, Mental Health Issues, Misgendering, Moon, Multi, Name Changes, Names, Outer Space, Panic, Poetic, Post-Kerberos Mission, Pre-Kerberos Mission, Returning Home, Soul-Searching, Stargazing, Stars, Texting, Trans Keith (Voltron), Trans Male Character, Weird Plot Shit, can you tell that i had no idea what i was doing, continuous use of she/her pronouns for keith bc y i k e s the boy is bad at feeling things, name meanings, old, probable plot holes
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-07-26
Updated: 2018-07-26
Packaged: 2019-06-16 13:30:52
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,626
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15438084
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/rmaowl/pseuds/rmaowl
Summary: shiro:that’s interesting, isn’t it? since you’re interested in space and the kerberos mission.It echoes in her head, along with all of the times that Shiro’s called her his moon. The noises begin to blend together seamlessly.Ayla. Turkish. “Halo of light around the moon.”It’s poetic, an omen of sorts.Ayla no longer wants to be Ayla.





	name the stars

At Ayla’s core burns a desperate urge to flee, an intense fire that scorches every other aspect of her until it all turns to desolate ash. She has become a creature of habit, a creature of making the same mistakes, a creature of panic. It’s integrated into her, engraved within her bones. It itches under her skin, a constant reminder that she craves to bleed out. She’s plagued by the idea of potentially being lulled into a false sense of security and so she’s never allowed to drop her guard. She can’t let herself feel safe, so she’s constantly on edge. She can’t push others out because they‘ve never gotten close.

When Ayla was little, round-faced, innocence tainted even in her young age, her father would take her hand in his larger one and guide it skywards. The sky was inky black, the stars were harsh pinpricks of white, the clouds were wispy and gray as they drifted lazily, and she found no meaning. He’d tell her stories about a mother she never even knew and she would think ‘what does she have to do with the sky?’

She’d barely listened to him then.

The sky is the only place she finds refuge now.

Ayla wants to be among the burning balls of gas that tie into her own raging fire, surrounded by no one and yet by everything. The only thing pressuring Ayla to bother surviving is the thought of how quiet her mind will be, how soft the itch will be, how empty it will feel in comparison.

She’s all sharp edges, both in her demeanor and in her physique.

 _She has this threatening air to her. A ticking time bomb, right?_ She overhears this more than once, simply rephrased each time, so it sticks.

 _Unhealthily thin, that new Kogane guy is._ A single careless comment, but it too lingers in the back of her mind.

At the Garrison, people are always talking. Consistently noisy, voices blending into one another, yet Ayla can always tell when they’re whispering about her. There are few people who don’t seem to be interested in gossip, and one of them is Matt. Another is Shiro.

Matt‘s her roommate and the first friend that she makes. They spend a lot of time helping each other study in the late hours when they’re supposed to be sleeping, giggling deliriously as they crack terrible jokes, quickly losing their focus.

Shiro, however, is one of the older pilots and a role model to many. He notices her skill in one of the flight simulators and approaches her just to build her up, which puzzles her deeply.

“You’re Ayla, correct?” He asks, arms crossed over his chest. He doesn’t seem upset, so she assumes that it‘s just a comfortable position for him and tries to focus.

“Yes.” She answers simply, dipping her head in a show of respect.

“That was excellent,” he says, a grin stretching across his lips, and she glances up in pure surprise. “You’re going to do great things someday, hopefully with the help of the Garrison.”

A moment’s pause, Ayla’s blue-gray eyes glittering at the unfamiliar praise.

“What does your name mean?” He asks suddenly.

“What does... what?” Her head tips to the side in confusion.

“What does your name mean? I don’t think I’ve ever heard it before.” He seems genuinely interested, which intrigues her.

“I... don’t know, actually.” Her tone sounds slightly defeated as she admits this.

He hums in consideration for a moment, brow furrowing, then he seems to decide something.

“Here. My number. I’ll let you know what it means later.”

A stunned silence. “Okay.”

* * *

**shiro:** _ayla, turkish, ”halo of light around the moon.”_

 **shiro:** _that’s interesting, isn’t it? since you’re interested in space and the kerberos mission._

* * *

“Hello, moon,” he greets the next time he sees her in the halls, and it manages to startle a laugh out of her.

That’s exactly when she realizes that she’s growing too close. She begins to distance herself from that moment on, making herself scarce. He seems to find her anyway, which is frustrating and confusing. Why does he care so much? Why should she matter to him?

“What’s wrong, my moon?” He questions gently when he finally manages to track her down. There’s no playful tinge to his voice, no hand ruffling her hair, only an unadulterated concern.

And... oh.

Oh.

That’s different.

* * *

**shiro:** _i got it!_

 **shiro:** _ayla, i got it._

 **shiro:** _i’m going on the kerberos mission._

 **shiro:** _sam and matt are too._

* * *

She’s happy for them.

She is.

She’s going to miss them.

Ayla is sitting quietly on her stiff bed, knees not quite touching her chest, as the door opens.

Matt reassures her in whispers, taking her hand in his to rub soft circles into it, but nothing seems to be getting through to her. He pauses.

“Ayla... there’s this code that me and Katie use to communicate with my dad on missions.” A small handbook is gently pressed into her hands. “I’m trusting you with this, okay? Take good care of it. Now, I know you’re not much of a math person, but here’s how it works...”

Ayla is incredibly touched, but she can’t find it in herself to cry. There’s a hollow feeling inside her that only continues to consume.

* * *

One day, Ayla types out a senseless message, some little tidbit that she knows Matt would find funny.

She doesn’t receive a response.

A bolt of intense fear strikes through her chest, because their replies are always immediate. This hasn’t happened before.

A few sparse hours later, an announcement from the Garrison has been put out.

_The Galaxy Garrison mission to the distant moon of Kerberos is missing, and all crew members are believed to be dead. The Galaxy Garrison says the crash was presumably caused by pilot error. It is indeed a sad day for all of humanity._

It echoes in her head, along with all of the times that Shiro’s called her his moon. The noises begin to blend together seamlessly.

Ayla. Turkish. “Halo of light around the moon.”

It’s poetic, an omen of sorts.

Ayla no longer wants to be Ayla.

With furious tears streaming down her cheeks, she wrenches her laptop away from where it sits on her desk, her fingers flying rapidly across the keys.

It’s a stupid idea. She knows it is.

‘Baby girl names.’ For once, autocorrect is her savior.

_Emma. Olivia. Ava. Isabella. Sophia. Mia. Charlotte. Amelia._

Somewhere she goes astray, accidentally clicks something, because she eventually becomes engrossed in _Top 1,000 Baby Boy Names._

_Liam. Noah. William. James. Logan. Benjamin. Mason. Elijah._

She scrolls for what feels like hours, curled up on that same stiff bed where Matt had comforted her, names flying past her in a blur.

Finally, she tires.

_Asa. Eden. Davis. Keith. Frederick. Rowen. Lawrence. Leonidas._

Her fingers ache and twitch as she slows to a halting stop.

She passes out right at that spot on the page, dehydrated from her tears, her laptop scalding her with its overworked heat.

The rest of her days at the Garrison are spent in a haze, her frantic search for another name lingering in the back of her mind, but she refuses to return to it. She doesn’t want to think about _that new Kogane guy_ or how she could never feel comfortable with her knees pulled all the way up to her chest or how maybe ending up at that website wasn’t an accident or any of the other repressed feelings she’s had over the years because she doesn’t know how to handle any of that. She’s never known how to.

She punches the next person to refer to her as a girl in the face, an anxious and tense energy building up under her skin, a familiar itch. The aforementioned _next person_ does happen to be Commander Iverson, which is apparently the final straw for the Garrison. She’s booted as soon as humanly possible, and she succumbs to a full-body flinch as soon as she thinks about how disappointed Shiro would be.

There’s only one place she can go from there, really, and that’s the old shack she used to live in. She swings a leg over the side of her hoverbike and urges it forwards. Dust flies up around her. The itching feeling under her skin ramps up the faster she pushes the vehicle.

As she arrives at her childhood house, it’s apparent that it’s no nicer than it was when she last saw it. Empty, desolate, and run-down as ever. The door creaks as she opens it. Same ragged brown couch with the creamy white sheet draped over it, acting as a makeshift bed. Same bulletin board hung up on the wall. Same broken windows, dirtied curtains drawn forcefully closed. Memories rush back to her as soon as she takes a single step inside, and she has to fight the need to expel the current contents of her stomach. Her teeth dig into her lower lip, not enough to pierce the skin, but enough to make it sting painfully. Her chest tightens. She’s actively holding her breath. Distantly, she knows that she’s only causing herself more panic. Oddly, forcing her lungs to be still feels logical in this situation. She doesn’t know why.

It begins to physically pain her, and her body jolts as a breath is forced past her lips. Inhaling and exhaling is a task.

She sits on the floor, in the center of the tattered shack. She doesn’t want to touch any of the furniture in here. She doesn’t think she can handle it just yet. She can’t handle a lot of things.

She shuts her eyes and lets time pass around her.


End file.
